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When Chris Matthews says we need a leader like George Bush to make decisions. He clarified by saying even though he did not agree with his decisions he was strong enough to make one.

When you start losing support from somebody like this you have backed yourself into a corner. This is coming from a former Carter speech writer. Just think what Putin thinks of our current administration.

I am in principle for the idea. I really like the idea of a divided Syria in the post war period. This would make for a good beginning to that end. Assad will be able to run this area over once he stabilized his own lines however. Strikes to destroy his air force, to force the whole civil war into a ground game, will give rebels time to fortify their areas. Developing an intelligence network in Syria to track Al-Qaida affiliated groups is hopefully already in progress. Right now the rebels advantage is numbers, but Assad will be able to "correct" that problem. It is only a matter of time. We have already identified a large portion of his chemical weapons. There is no meaningful negotiation offers. Once in the UN we will be politically gummed up. The time to act is now. To truly pressure Assad into a suitable solution or have him hung in the street by his own people.

Ole and Sven are quietly sitting in a boat fishing, chewing and drinking beer when suddenly Sven says, 'I think I'm gonna divorce my wife - she ain't spoke to me in over 2 months.' Ole sips his beer and says, 'Better think it over...women like that are hard to find.'

Embattled Syria analyst Elizabeth O'Bagy now admits she was never enrolled in a Ph.D. program despite claims to the contrary as she rose -- and quickly fell -- as a prominent scholar whose writings were used to make the case for military intervention in Syria.

O'Bagy also has resigned from a Washington-based, pro-Syrian opposition group in the wake of the controversy.

The resignation and the admission, made in a statement to The Daily Beast, caps a remarkable turn of events for O'Bagy, who a little more than a week ago was traveling in rarified circles, as a frequently quoted analyst whose work was also cited on Capitol Hill. Both Secretary of State John Kerry and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., touted her analysis that the Syrian opposition was mostly moderate, as they pushed for a strike on the Assad regime.

Yet O'Bagy was fired last week from the Institute for the Study of War after the think tank alleged she lied about her education credentials. The institute claimed O'Bagy did not have a Ph.D. degree from Georgetown University as she had claimed.

O'Bagy reportedly countered that she had defended her dissertation, and was simply waiting for the university to confer the degree. But in a statement to The Daily Beast, O'Bagy reportedly admitted she was never enrolled in that program. She apparently applied to a joint master's/Ph.D. program, but was not accepted. She was only in the master's program.

"I would like to deeply apologize to every person with whom I have worked, who has read and depended upon my research, and to the general public," O'Bagy said in a statement. "While I have made many mistakes and showed extremely poor judgment, I most particularly regret my public misrepresentation of my educational status and not immediately disclosing that I had not been awarded a doctorate in May 2013."

She went on to say that the damage she caused was "irreparable" and that she has resigned from the Syrian Emergency Task Force. She said she nevertheless stands by her findings from her work inside Syria.
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013...#ixzz2fAdVx2uV

Finally, whether by chemical weapons or by conventional weapons, the violence against civilians in Syria has gone on too long and it must stop. An agreement on the destruction and removal of chemical weapons is not a substitute for a political solution. The 100,000 or more dead Syrians makes it gravely clear that a political transition is urgently needed to end the violence.

The author of the article continues that the rebels didn't care about the chemical weapons either.

But instead of celebrating the recent deal to destroy chemical weapons, many rebels felt betrayed. So betrayed, in fact, that they joined the rebels’ most extremist, al Qaeda-linked groups in the north.

Recently on NPR’s Morning Edition a so-called moderate Syrian rebel spokesman admitted that the rebels didn’t give a tinker’s damn about chemical weapons. The rebel aim all along has been to sucker the U.S. into intervening on their behalf. When the U.S. and Russia brokered a deal to destroy Assad’s chemical weapons, some “moderate” rebels immediately joined the side of America’s real enemy. And I don’t mean Assad.

G.Clinchy@gmail.com"Know in your heart that all things are possible. We couldn't conceive of a miracle if none ever happened." -Libby Fudim

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